I have borked my install several times now, and have had to format and reinstall several times now.

Something happened on the last go that I didn't realize until now.

For whatever reason, Ubuntu decided to format and install to my external hard drive. I had secured my HDD before this. Now, it won't boot (even though it says the name of the drive is ubuntu in my Boot Utilities).

When I try to install Ubuntu from my thumb drive, the utility doesn't recognize my HDD and won't install anywhere.

This is very frustrating. The OS is running slowly off of my external, and I don't want to go back to Windows. I just want to format my HDD and start with a fresh install.

Please let me know if you need further information to help with this fix.